Aloha Bike Commuters… I’m all cappuccino’d up and ready to roll! Today’s feature, everyone’s favorite two-legged entity: PANTS! In particular, a review of the Chrome Vanya Riding Knicker – knicker makes me snicker…! If you remember our earlier article, I mentioned that we received these women’s riding snickers about two months ago from the sunny drain bamaged Chrome folks out of San Francisco. (I jest – SF BC.com readers, I too hail from the land of sunshine-crack California).

Pants - as interpreted by The Oatmeal

The DL: My fave commuter-to-office-to-pau-hana PANTS! I have done daily rides, night rides, long hot sunny rides (not my favorite for the Vanya) and morning commutes. I love the pockets, capri-length, fit, wicking, easy washable and durable material and the transformation to business casual with heels. Only gripe is the crotch panel gets swampy with our humid weather, even if I go commando! I do appreciate the panel nonetheless, since you don’t have to sit on a hefty seam during your ride. The only thing hefty about the Chrome Vanya is the price tag at $120.

The riding snickers come in both Charcoal and BlueSteel (not to be confused with Derek Zoolander’s”Blue Steel”.)

Full Frontal of Little Miss Vanya... a.k.a. "Pants"

Me Likey: I have just been putting them to the test for 15 minute lunch errands to the Zach Manago Ride in Paradise. The pants are versatile enough to work for anytime short or long-range commutes if the temperature is not too hot. Good in the summer rains too, the Vanya snickers don’t give a shiz about rain or mud – the stuff wicks well, and bike grease comes off easy in the wash! Plus, you don’t look like a spando weirdo rolling into a bar or restaurant after work – no clothes change necessary from commuter to socialite… (uhhh, does that qualify for cycle chic!?) The pants have a good amount of stretch and a solid fit with no butt crack revelations along the way! Everyone at my work loves them too; they are jealous of them as regular office pants, and double jealous when they found out they are bike-friendly. Last but not least, the pants were most comfy while biking around Lake Tahoe for a family vacay: perfect length and material for dry sunny afternoons transitioning to crisp, cold evenings.

Chrome Vanya women's pants fared best in Lake Tahoe summer weather!

That’s right folks, theses pants are SO amazing, I would bike a charity century ride around Oahu and puke tons of HEED electrolyte drinks if the reward at the end was a pair of Chrome Vanya Riding Knickers instead of a dri-fit commemorative tee.

Back it up: two patch pockets reinforced with red stitching!

Me NO Likey: The gripes about the Vanya are few and far between: namely that they are too warm for extra hot days and on the pricey side! When I rode them on long rides in bajillion percent humidity at 12pm in Honolulu, I got so hot that my shins were sweating! I rolled them up past the knee and toughed it out… but all in all, I should have opted for spandex in the first place. Also, me NO likey the price tag on the snickers, at 120 bones, I would much rather buy a separate pair of bike pants and work pants. (Then again, this is coming from the person who shops at the Goodwill and my sister’s closet).

Pants Recap: Thank you, Chrome, for making a stylish, versatile, durable, and stretchy cladding for my lower half! My former Vanya-less pantsless self (imagine me standing on a median, with a cardboard sign saying “Will Bike for Pants”) could never have imagined a better fit! I will definitely wear these guys into the ground on and off the bike! All you Cycle Ladies in search of a nice urban commuter pants option, check out the Chrome Vanya if you have mad cash money to spare.

AMENDMENT!!! After some skepticism from the general public that the Vanya can do a heels pants transformation megatron, I have decided to post this photo that I cajoled a camera-owning friend of mine to take! In Honolulu, the capri or cropped pants and heels look totally passes for business casual! Check it peeps:

Chrome Vanya gets down to business with a red top and black summer heels: YOU CAN DO IT!

Hello loyal, curious, or bored-at-work Bike Commuters readers! Here to report from the island of Oahu is Mir.I.Am. A couple of enthralling bikely updates are in order regarding two of everyone’s favorite bike-related topics: A) Political two-wheeling and 2) Pants-wearing.

Disclaimer on Adulthood: When trying to balance adulthood, I frequently find myself writing lists to prioritize where I will spend my time. Some recent lists of things that matter/hold my attention span for longer than 17 seconds:

Fist Pump for gettin' things DONE.

Back to Two-Wheeled Mayoral Rides:

When I tried to insert meeting politicians for bike advocacy into the equation we end up with a list like this:

As you can see, it took quite a while for me to come up with something more compelling than #13 (Meeting Politicians) , even though this particular event is involved in #5 (Bike Stuff) and #7 (Volunteering). Tanks of bullfrogs were added to put things in perspective. Actually, tanks of bullfrogs are pretty cool but they are a little icky especially knowing that they are being sold to Asians as food and not pets. Getting dressed is worse than tanks of bullfrogs and politicians.

Tanks of Yumfrogs in Honolulu Chinatown

Needless to say, Chad Taniguchi (my apparent hanai bike step-dad of HBL) convinced me via email to volunteer to represent the HBL in a meeting with Mayor Peter Carlisle of Honolulu last week. In some circles, meeting with politicians may be considered “advocacy”, which is leaps and bounds better than just promoting “awareness“.

We went over some policy wonkiness (a.k.a. poli-wonkies) as follows:

Mayor recognizes HBL is an active, large, diverse, responsible organization that can help Honolulu become a bike friendly city

Mayor is willing to work with HBL, support us publicly, including riding on a high profile ride

Mayor embraces vision for bike friendly Hawaii and is willing to have departments work together with HBL to make it so

Mayor supports Complete Streets ordinance and vulnerable users’ bill in principle; provides channel to work on it with HBL

Mayor is willing to meet with HBL again in 6 months

Oops, I missed the note to make a serious face.

A “great success!” resulted from our meeting with the Mayor, in that he agreed to ride with HBL this Sunday for the Zach Manago Ride in Paradise, a two-day ride around the island in support of bike safety on Oahu. Surf Mayor Peter Carlisle will join us at the beginning of the ride from the State Capitol to Waikiki – on a loaner bike despite sarcastic complaints of his pants needing a squishy seat. Although poli-wonky advocacy is not my favorite type (see “how-to” on profuse hand-waving technique from my original commuter profile), this one turned out pretty good.

On to Pants:

Speaking of pants… Review coming up soon for these amazing Chrome Vanya Knickers that arrived in the mail yesterday! (Cue pants fanfare…) As you can see from the above list of adulthood priorities, “pants” falls under the category of #14: Getting Dressed, not one of my favorite activities in the land of bikinis.

As far as clothing goes, I can say that it’s pretty enjoyable to be inside these knickers like an Anchorman Pants Party! I plan to ride/sweat in them for a solid 20-30 miles on Sunday during the Zach Manago Ride in Paradise. Passing on the sham-crotch-spando wear in favor of pants that actually looks like, well, PANTS!

Until next time, or until I get a real camera so I can show an updated photo of my awesome 3M ruban reflechissant as well as said pants in action, please enjoy the following scan:

On a day with a more sturdy xerox machine, I would have put them on and scanned my butt, but this is probably less obscene. Vanya Pants Scan!

We shall see if pants-worthy political advocacy moves up on the list of adulthood priorities after the Sunday ride – to my Hawaii Bike Commuters, see you this weekend! Later, Cycle-gators.